


Sitting Ducks

by ForNought



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Kink Meme, M/M, Theme Park AU, WWI AU, haha wow sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-26
Updated: 2013-08-26
Packaged: 2017-12-24 18:33:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,266
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/943266
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ForNought/pseuds/ForNought
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jean is a soldier in France during The Great War, though he is a bit more focused on the fact that he is completely enamoured by fellow soldier Armin Arlert. Between marching his way to battle with his troops and stealing moments with Armin, he has trouble making sense of everything. </p><p>Armin works at a theme park where the owners have a penchant for rhyming the names of each area in the park. He also sort of might have a massive crush on Jean who works the pirate ship. </p><p>In one version of events they end up a lot happier than in the other.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sitting Ducks

**Author's Note:**

> Written for a prompt at the snk kink meme (http://snkkink.dreamwidth.org/2124.html?thread=2951500)  
> I'm sorry, I played fast and loose with this prompt

_Then, as I probed them, one sprang up, and stared_  
 _With piteous recognition in fixed eyes,_  
 _Lifting distressful hands as if to bless._  
 _And by his smile, I knew that sullen hall;_  
 _By his dead smile I knew we stood in Hell._  
- _Strange Meeting_ , Wilfred Owen 

 

Following the stripe of white moonlight that peered in through the ajar barn window, Jean's fingers trailed up the pale trunk of Armin's body. The other man shivered at the touch, stifled a laugh when Jean's fingers, clumsy and calloused, danced along his ribs. He had a habit of laughing a lot and it made Jean frown. Even in what post-sex contentment they could manage, they were in the middle of a war. How could Armin laugh at a time like this? 

The pair of them had sneaked away to one of the barns on this huge French farm that their regiment was allowed to stay at. The farmer's daughter had invited Jean to the barn a few nights previously, though he rejected as politely as he could in what little broken French he could think of. At least, Jean assumed that was what she was offering after picking up "big barn" and "this evening". Not that it mattered when he could be here with Armin. 

Armin who had laughed at his German sounding surname and said, "So it seems the Fritz is among us. You wouldn't mind turning around for a moment, would you?" before miming shooting a gun at him. Armin who had admitted he only enlisted because he was sick of seeing white feathers, so many that he had enough to make his own hen. Armin who gasped in delight when Jean pulled him into a dark corner and kissed him but tipped his chin down and denied that he had been enticing Jean all along. Armin who talked of going travelling when the war was over, perhaps to visit some of the foreign territories of the Empire, and asked whether Jean would like to come along. 

"Do you love me?" Jean asked quietly. Armin rolled towards him, rustling the hay they lay on and pressing the heat of his body against Jean tightly. 

"I suppose I must," he said as he kissed a trail from Jean's shoulder to his jaw. Jean splayed his hand across Armin's back and wondered whether he could possibly hold him much closer. 

 

#

 

In the break room, Mikasa rested her head on Armin's shoulder. She had muttered something about how she never wanted to work on the roller coasters again. She said the riders on the roller coasters were intolerable little brats before collapsing against Armin's side and shutting her eyes tightly. He shrugged his shoulder against the black-haired woman and asked, "Is it really that bad?" 

Mikasa never exaggerated and Armin wondered how bad things would need to be for her to brand people intolerable. She tilted her head up to look at him and in a dark voice said, "Seriously, the worst day." 

"How bad though? Apparently Sasha has been paying back a favour that involved trying to retrieve lost shoes." 

"Yeah, but she didn't have to deal with the little scrotes who were stupid enough to lose their shoes. It's like these people have never heard of shoelaces." 

"Don't be too hard on them, they might never have learnt to tie their laces," Armin said.

"If they never learnt to tie their shoelaces they are too stupid to go to any theme park anywhere in the world." With that, Mikasa shut her mouth with a click and closed her eyes. Armin had sort of been hoping to eat his lunch while he was in the break room but past experience told him his plans would have to change. He slipped his wallet back into his pocket and made a mental note to at least stop by one of the food vendors before they closed at 5. He smiled and shook his head when Christa asked whether he wanted a cup of tea, though he wasn't looking forward to completing the rest of his shift on an empty stomach. 

"How come you're taking your break at the same time as me, instead of with Eren?" Armin asked when he had two and a half minutes of free time left. 

"Can't I spend my break with a good friend?"

"No, you can't. When you take a break, the pillar of flume town is missing." Armin understood that the eye roll in response was implied while Mikasa still had her eyes closed. The Flume was closed for repairs today. "You're right, you haven't been there all day, have you." 

For some convoluted reason, Mikasa was called The Pillar of Flume Town. It was probably because the log flume was her baby. The log flume was the only reason people bothered venturing to the Spume Town sector of the park, which is why it was known as Flume Town as opposed to Hook-A-Duck Town or Pirate Ship Town. Aside from being a crowd pleaser, Mikasa probably liked the log flume because nobody had yet been stupid enough to lose their shoes whilst riding it. 

"He's watching you again." 

"Hmm?"

Mikasa's dark eyelashes fluttered but her eyes didn't open. She whispered, "Pirate." 

Armin's eyes swept the room and he hadn't even noticed that Jean from the Pirate Ship was in the break room. That was the kind of thing he would usually notice so it was strange that his presence had slipped past Armin's radar. Jean from the Pirate Ship noticed Armin's gaze quite quickly and immediately looked down at the magazine in his lap. Armin looked back to Mikasa on his shoulder and saw that her eyes were still decidedly shut. 

"No he isn't," Armin muttered. He gently pushed Mikasa from his shoulder and she sat up easily.

"Break's over already?"

"I just want to get back to the ducks," Armin said. Mikasa gave him a pointed look but he didn't try to make further excuses. He left the break room and made his way to Flume Town. The sun was high in the sky, warming the still air to an uncomfortable degree. The gardens seemed to be appreciating the good weather though. Armin's route to Flume Town cut through the park gardens because there were always less visitors there and he never had to doge and weave around dawdlers. It was a shame that Marco and the rest of the gardening force worked so hard to make the grasses match an idyllic shade of green, and tended to the lush leaves and brilliant blooms when the guests hardly appreciated it. 

Marco was doing one of his quick, biweekly inspections of the flowerbeds when he straightened and waved. Armin waved back but didn't quite understand the bemused smile he could make out on Marco's face at the returned gesture. He stopped walking when he heard footsteps close behind him on the path. Armin glanced over his shoulder to see Jean from the Pirate Ship. Oh, so Marco probably wasn't even waving at Armin at all. Still, he smiled politely and wondered whether it was just a coincidence that their breaks both happened to end at the same time. He waited for Jean to fall into step beside him. He didn't want to think to hard about the timing of their breaks, just in case he was wrong. 

"Hi, Armin." 

"Hi, Jean."

Neither of them said anything else as they made their way through the gardens. As fond of Jean as Armin was, he sort of hated it when they walked to Flume Town together. It sometimes seemed there was something between them but Armin really had no clue. Jean made him feel a little bit nervous, like he was waiting for test results, but Armin's loaded feeling would dissipate when Jean - or Captain Douchebag, as Eren had christened him - asked a stupid question about how Armin was sleeping. Jean didn't ask any stupid questions this time but Armin found it difficult to tell whether that was a good thing or not. 

 

#

 

"I really like your hair," Jean said. 

"It's the same as anyone else's." 

When Armin sat up, he still had strands of hay sticking out everywhere. No, Jean thought, Armin's hair was most certainly not the same as anyone else's. It was soft and a little bit less golden that the hay that tried to blend in with it. His hair wasn't the same as anyone else's like this, the neat parting at the right gone while his hair was messy and loosely tangled. Jean reached up and plucked dry, crackling hay from near Armin's ear. He cleared his throat and said, "I love you, you know, but you scare me." 

"What reason would you have to be afraid of me?" 

"You speak so plainly but I'm still unsure about what you feel for me." Jean rolled onto his back and scrunched his eyes shut. He shouldn't even have been thinking about things like this. He shouldn't have been wasting time even saying things like this. They were in the second year of the Great War and they both had more serious things to think about than Jean's insecurities. 

"I care for you a great deal," Armin said. He rolled to his feet and stepped into his thick uniform trousers. "I absolutely care for you more than I do our other comrades, as awful as that sounds." 

"It doesn't sound awful. You know that's how I feel too. It terrifies me that I might lose you. I couldn't bring myself to feel half as much terror were it anybody else in question. Meeting you seems like something that was meant to happen to me but everything else about this war... I hate the fact that you're here because it means you're in danger and I would much prefer any other way of meeting somebody as dear to me as you."

There was something about the sound of Armin dressing that Jean did not like. The rustle of wool and cotton and the clack of buttons and buckles. That alone was enough to stir anxiousness deep within him. Barefoot, the sounds of Armin's steps were imperceptible in the barn so Jean was surprised when he felt Armin's weight pressing down on him. Armin kissed like he had never kissed before, like he had never even learnt how. Jean's eyes opened to see a tight expression on Armin's face as his lower lip trembled and he rapidly blinked tears from his eyes. 

"Don't doubt me just because you think I speak too plainly," Armin said, his voice cracking. "You know that meeting would have been impossible without us both enlisting. If us meeting was something that was meant to happen then it could only have happened because of the war. Knowing you are also in danger pains me but it is the only way. Though I don't know what I'd do if anything happened to you." 

"You would keep fighting because you are a soldier." 

"You make me sound heartless." 

"I don't. You must do your duty for King and Country." 

Armin thumped Jean in the side but there was no harm in it. He sniffed loudly and said, "I'll use my bayonet on you. I'll try my best to slice off the hand that bothers you. The hand that makes reloading your rifle slow, you know, the hand you never touch me with." Armin's hand crept along Jean's right arm as though to demonstrate the point. "They'll have to send you back to England and then you'll be safe." 

Jean craned his neck up to kiss Armin lightly. Then he said, "You shouldn't be here either. Your lungs are-"

"You can't see asthma," Armin said. "The gas might get to me a bit quicker and I find it harder to keep up but the girls back home don't know that. They don't care about that. All they care about is me not pulling my weight on the frontlines." 

Armin rolled off Jean, lying back down in the hay and making his hair a mess. At the sharp intake of breath, Jean looked over to see Armin had pressed his palms to his eyes. Of course he would be crying. Nobody here really wanted to die. 

 

Jean had already thought he lost Armin once. It was a few weeks ago when their regiment was pushing against some German lines. His right arm had been giving him trouble for a while now, it was part of the reason he was sent back to England to have it operated on - of course that wasn't the sole reason he was sent back as that on top of some psychological issues had got him several months of respite. He really was at a disadvantage where reloading his rifle was concerned but he just needed to keep low on the ground, aim through the shell smoke and hope for the best. His battalion were instructed to take a German trench but it was slow going, slithering and scrambling across the muddy ground to avoid gunfire. 

And then he had stopped because the uniform in front of him was not his own. He was just a boy, maybe not even eighteen, and Jean wondered whether the Hun had also been telling their young, in mantra-like Latin, that it was sweet and honourable to die for their country. He looked terrified and raised his mud-caked hands. "Please," the boy shouted, his desperate scream blotting out the sounds of falling shells around them. Then in French so heavily accented the boy may as well have been speaking German, he said, "Je ne veux pas morir." 

Jean nodded. He'd pretend not to see this deserter and hoped his comrades wouldn't see this as a spy attempt from the enemy. This child couldn't have done anything to help his own troops. He tried to move on but the familiar shriek of a falling shell was too close. It sounded different though, more of a lamenting wail than all the other times he had heard it. By the time Jean realised where the shell would fall it had almost landed. 

Jean had been in a daze following the shell attack. He was found in a crater, completely covered in mud but mostly uninjured. He was fine and only needed the support of one soldier's shoulder on the way past a shrapnel riddled corpse that seemed to groan minutely, back to one of the rear trenches. After being checked over by a medic there was only one question on Jean's tongue. It was a question he knew he shouldn't ask - a question that shouldn't have come to him if the only love in him was the comradeship of his fellow soldiers - but he asked it anyway. "Where's Armin?" he asked. Then, "Private Arlert, where is he?"

"I couldn't tell you right now, officer, but I don't believe I recall that name from the casualties," was the answer. Jean didn't quite believe Armin was fine so he spent a few morose hours wondering where he was. Nobody he asked had seen Private Arlert, not many of them seemed to care all that much either. They all had their own friends to care about. Jean understood that but dread was still building in the pit of his stomach. That was until Armin came to find Jean with a cup of tea and two cigarettes he nicked from one of the other soldiers.

They had alternated sips of the murky tea and smoked the cigarettes a little too quickly in the frigid night. The stars seemed so much further away down this hole. It was like a premature burial, Jean had thought, being down in these trenches and just waiting the agonisingly long wait for someone to fill in the grave. Jean stomped his feet in his boots a few times, glad that it hadn't rained recently and that the trench hadn't quite hit groundwater, and stubbed out his cigarette on the wooden boards that had been laid down as floor. For just a few hours before that moment he had been coming to terms with what losing Armin would feel like. He couldn't let that happen. He said, "It's like a nightmare." 

Armin coughed, a horrid sound but it was his own fault because he had been smoking, and said, "Odd as it may sound, I feel I've known more nightmares with you." 

 

Sitting half-naked in the barn, Jean looked down at Armin, who trembled as he tried to stem the flow of his tears, and recalled that admission. He stroked Armin's hair and decided that he would live a hundred more nightmares with Armin if it meant they could have times together like this.

 

#

 

Jean wandered over to the Hook-a-Duck station less than an hour after the end of break with two burgers. He handed one to Armin who accepted cautiously. There was a moment when Armin wasn't sure whether he should eat this, as though it was not truly for him, but when Jean sat down on a stool on the other side of the partition, he did not eat his own burger until Armin started on his. After that silent meal, Jean peered up at Armin and said, "It's even more yellow up close." 

"It's a giant rubber duck," Armin shrugged. He moved away from Jean, tried to act natural, as he moved some of the ducks that were on their way to causing a blockage in the little stream. 

"It's probably chasing away all my potential riders, you know, the yellowness of it offending their pirate sensibilities," Jean said. 

Armin coughed awkwardly. He said, "What?" 

"Because it's yellow? You know, like when pirates say yellow-bellied... and stuff." 

"Right, yeah. Did pirates say that?"

Jean's smile faltered and he sat up slowly. "I don't know. I thought they did. You know, like lily-livered... bilge-rats?"

"I guess you're the expert," Armin said. He tried a laugh but it came out nervous and artificial. He stopped short when the sound that echoed flatly from the inside of the giant duck jarred too much on his ears. He picked up one of his many hooked sticks and passed it over the partition. "Would you like a free go?" 

"What, really?" Jean asked. "You'd even give me a prize if I won?"

Armin hesitated. "Well, I mean I'm only offering because nobody is around. I don't know if you're going to want to carry around a giant toy duck all day. I guess if you won you could choose whatever though." 

"A date." 

"What?" 

"I'm sorry, that was probably out of order," Jean mumbled. He tightened his hands around the pole Armin hand handed him. 

"Um," Armin's eyes scanned the park. Spume Town - maybe only going by its official name on a day when the log flume was closed - was practically deserted. There were just a few stragglers who walked up to the flume to read the sign about its repairs. The people then shrugged and grumbled and went off to any of the other sectors of the park. They hadn't even bothered going as far as the pirate ship so it was no wonder Jean wasn't bothering to watch it. Armin's face felt hot and there was nobody around. He couldn't be entirely certain that Jean had really been asking for a date but there was nobody around. He said, "If you win." 

It was Jean's turn to be surprised. "If I win?" he repeated dumbly. 

Armin nodded ever so slightly. He wasn't even sure that Jean would see the nod. Maybe it wouldn't matter if Jean didn't see the nod because he hadn't been able to affirm that it wasn't a poorly thought out joke. 

"Can you look at me please? Unless of course you are too overwhelmed by my dashing good looks. I'll understand if that is the case, you know." Armin glanced down at Jean and saw that he was smiling a subtle sort of smile. Jean continued, "Maybe you've developed an immunity to my charms. I don't mind, I suppose, as long as you mean it about a date. If I win."

Armin nodded and Jean's smile widened to the more often seen self-confident grin he usually wore. He was about to reach over to hook a duck when Armin grabbed the pole. Jean looked puzzled and Armin's chest felt weird. After a moment he said, "It's better if you stand up. A lot of times the prize winners aren't within reach when you sit."

Jean nodded before heeding the advice. He stood up and poised, ready to hook a duck as though it would be a lot more difficult than just weaving the curved end of the pole through the loops on the ducks' heads. After far too long contemplating the uniformly yellow blobs of plastic, Jean got a duck. It involved a lot of splashing around and clattering, but he got the one he chose. He pointed the pole in Armin's direction and told him he wanted Armin to announce the result. Armin unhooked the duck. It was just a completely yellow duck. He stared at the bottom of the duck as though that would change the bottom colour to a winning one. 

"Armin?" 

"Oh, um, yeah. You won." 

"Seriously?" Jean's grin probably couldn't have gotten any wider. Armin nodded and smiled and completely missed the fact that Jean was reaching over to grab the duck. He started to move back a little bit too late and Jean snatched it from his hands. Jean's face probably couldn't have fallen any faster. "That's... not really true." 

"Sorry." 

"I bet I was really close though," Jean said. He handed the duck back but didn't let go when Armin had a hold on it. He took a deep breath and said, "But, I still got one. You give away consolation prizes too, don't you?"

He already knew the answer but the look he was giving Armin was a bit more significant than the ones he usually sent Armin's way. Oh, right. Armin nodded quickly. "Yes. I suppose maybe we can't have a date because you didn't win but, um, maybe if you wanted to just hang out?" 

"That sounds ducking great!" 

Armin flushed a deep pink and wondered what he had gotten himself into. 

 

#

 

They were marching to Somme. The French countryside looked wonderful in late June, almost inviting in the simplicity of its beauty. Jean longed for home. The countryside back home was different somehow. Jean couldn't put his finger on it but the grass and the air and the animals all seemed continental. They were visibly the same but holistically differed to the English countryside back home. 

Jean wanted to take Armin back home. As it was Summer, they could play cricket with Jean's colleagues - men that might already have died in this war, Jean realised with a grimace - though that would have to be after Jean had put in enough hours down in the mine. Well, some of the other miners would never think Jean could ever put in enough hours with an accent as pronounced as the one Jean had developed from living down south for most of his life. It was mostly in good humour, but there was something about the older miners back in Sheffield that told Jean he wasn't well liked. They probably wouldn't take his friendship with Armin any better than they had taken to him so maybe the pair could venture elsewhere. 

Jean's mother had always gone on about how the family should take the train down to Oxford for a picnic somewhere more cultured than the ravaged landscapes of the north. Jean wouldn't mind taking Armin there. Better still they could take the train to Blackpool; Armin had said he had never been to the Pleasure Beach so that might be fun. Apparently Armin had never been to any beach at all and Jean thought that was criminal. Everyone should see the sea at least once in their lives. They should see it properly, not just from a boat sending them to their deaths, and Jean wanted to make it happen. 

It was the heat. That was what was different about France. The heat and the channels that had been tramped through the fields and roads as the soldiers marched on. 

 

#

 

Armin hadn't known a hell like this. The most popular park sector was Zoom Town. It was the most popular sector by far and it was swarmed with visitors, ranging from thrill-seekers to their reluctant friends. There were people everywhere and the ride Armin had got himself working today - Wings of Freedom, the fastest roller coaster with the most loops and turns in the park - apparently attracted even more visitors than the log flume. Well, it was only to be expected seeing as it was the roller coaster being advertised on the television at the moment, but somehow that equated to attracting all the pushy arseholes within a hundred mile radius. At least Armin wasn't working the queue for the front car. He only had to deal with the single riders, but Jean had to put up with everyone who insisted that the line for the four front seats could go faster and that they didn't have all day. 

Whatever Eren had taken the day off for, he must have been prepared to pay back the favour in a pretty substantial way. 

At least they had a quick changeover working on a ride like this. Flume Town was under its second complete shutdown in three months as they got mechanics in to see to the log flume, and Armin was offended on Jean's behalf that the park owners didn't set much stock in the crowd-pulling capabilities of the pirate ship. So they only had to work for half the day, probably to make up for the stress of dealing with this many self-important people. 

At the end of their shift, Armin was glad to get out of there and he didn't doubt that Jean felt the same. It was too hot everywhere. It was either too hot under the sun or it was the more off-putting heat that is produced from huge crowds of people. He was trying to waft air under the hem of his T-shirt for some circulation near his skin. Jean snorted as he fell into step beside Armin. 

"What?" Armin frowned. 

"Nothing. Nothing at all." 

"You don't look like it's nothing."

"It is nothing, I promise," Jean insisted. "It's been a tough day though. It's a nightmare I'd rather not have to relive again tomorrow." 

Armin didn't have time to contemplate what the look meant when Jean started talking about how he wanted to introduce Armin to all his friends. Armin felt too hot and embarrassed and he felt awkward enough with the people they both knew being aware of the relationship. There was a spark of happiness within him though. Jean was under the impression that this was going to last long enough that it was important that Armin knew the people Jean knew. It was something else to be happy about other than the fact that last night Jean had got himself off by thrusting between Armin's thighs and then gave him a blow job. It was pretty great actually but just remembering it made Armin's skin prickle. He didn't need to make himself feel worked-up and uncomfortable in an already dreadfully hot day. 

They stopped at the staff offices to say their goodbyes and clock-out and Armin was a bit surprised that this felt like his natural routine. He should always come into work with Jean and leave at the same time as him, go to Jean's flat and then fall asleep watching Law and Order. That was what had happened for his past few shifts, but of course this time they had a whole afternoon free. They could do a lot in an afternoon.

Armin remembered the what the look on Jean's face reminded him of when they were about halfway across the car park. It was the exact same look Jean wore last night before asking - 

"Can I kiss you?"

"We're at work," Armin said. It was the exact same question in the exact same tone. He swiped the back of his hand across his brow and hoped that he wasn't sweating quite as much as he thought he was in this heat. 

"We're leaving work," Jean corrected. "I was hoping that was why you had stopped though. For a kiss." 

"When we're in the car."

"Alright then. Though, I'm not sure I can last the trip to the car without a little something."

"Are you ill?" Armin asked. Jean should have said something if he was coming down with something. 

"No, No, I-" Jean scratched at the back of his neck and stepped closer to Armin so that he didn't have to speak so loud. He was quite pink and it wasn't just from the heat. "I just meant that I'd like to hold your hand or something." 

"Oh. Oh." Armin surreptitiously wiped at his upper lip and wondered how he had misunderstood. "We're at work though."

"I already told you, we're leaving work. Ymir and Christa hold hands all the time." Jean flushed a deeper shade of pink and Armin wondered what Jean's definition of 'all the time' was. He slid his hand into Jean's all the same and looked away from the pleased smile it elicited. Armin hated the way Jean turned him back into an awkward teenager but he was sort of perfect so it seemed like an even trade.

Jean said, "Is this a weird time to tell you I think I love you?" 

It was a very weird time to confess that, Armin thought. They were standing in the middle of a car park, the bright sun a reflected glare from the heated cars all around them, they were sweaty and flushed, they were tightly joined at the hands, and they had only been together for a shade over two months. It was a very weird time to tell Armin that. But he couldn't help that his heart was bursting and his mouth was splitting into a grin too wide for his face. 

"No. I'm the same. I think I love you too."

 

#

 

Instead of sleeping, Jean and Armin were wasting their hours of rest. While others were playing cards, exchanging letters to loved ones at home, or just drinking the time away, they were nestled in one of the bunks. They were supposed to go on watch in a few hours. Maybe they would steal kissed by the candlelight, and maybe that would be when a surprise attack would be launched and a battalion would be wiped out because two of their own were so pathetically in love. 

Before all those maybes, Jean had simply wanted to talk. 

"There was this boy I knew - well, I say boy but he was a man. He was around a year older than me and his calmness was probably borne from maturity." Armin lay his head on Jean's chest and it made Jean smile. It was like the pressure of Armin's head over his heart translated to pure happiness. He savoured that feeling for a moment before he went on, "He lived outside of Sheffield, so I didn't see him often, but he worked at a manor house and he would come into town sometimes. Once I asked him what it was like working there and he told me it was just like Wuthering Heights." 

Armin snorted. The bunk creaked as he moved to rest a hand on Jean's chest and he said, "Just like Wuthering Heights?" 

"Just like it, he told me. One of the sons at the house wanted to go to war the second it was announced, but his family forbade him. He and Marco both seemed to have these romantic ideas about the war, about how great it could be. Marco signed up by himself and promised the son that he would write to him about combat and how it felt to fight for your country. I was with him during the training, you know, about seven months, and we became pretty good friends by the end of it. His first day of combat, he tripped onto a mine. Blew off his arm and half his face. Someone had to shoot him to properly put him out of his misery." 

Armin's hand had tightened to a fist on Jean's chest and he was pressing down almost painfully. 

"Anyway, I'd lost the first good friend I'd made since moving up north. I'm told I developed some sort of problem. A psychological problem. I almost maimed myself apparently. I don't really remember much of it though. I remember finding out that Marco wasn't really a footman, or a valet, or whatever he'd convinced me he was. He was the son from the manor the whole time. He ran away from home and his title and enlisted because he was an idealist. He died because he had been sheltered his whole life and thought this was his chance to serve his king." 

"That sounds horridly tragic."

"Yes, it does."

For a while the only sounds were of people's footsteps tap-tap-tapping on the wooden planks of the trench floors outside the sleeping area. A few of the other bunks were occupied and they creaked and wheezed with the weight of soldiers who were attempting some semblance of sleep. 

Unprompted, Armin said, "I have never killed anybody." 

"What do you mean?" 

"I mean exactly that. Through all of the battles, I have not killed a man." He lifted his head and looked at Jean. It was as though this was the deepest confession he had ever made in his life. In one way it was impressive because Jean had known Armin for months, together they had been fighting for months, and that was a long time to live without killing. 

"That's..."

"Pathetic, that's what that is. It was a waste of time and training, and I am no help whatsoever." 

"Surely that means you have made good decisions. If you have been able to make it through this long without putting yourself in the situation where you must kill or be killed, I like it better that way. Please keep doing what you're doing."

For a long while, Armin didn't say anything. Jean poked the other man in the ribs and he smiled at the squirm he caused. He was serious though. He needed Armin to survive. 

Eventually, Armin said, "I'll try but you can't die either."

 

# 

 

Armin didn't move when he heard the bedroom door open. He was tired and neither he nor Jean had to go and work at the park, so they could totally spend all day lying in bed and watching movies if they wanted to. That was what Armin wanted to do anyway. He liked Jean's bed because it was more comfortable than his own. He might also have liked Jean's bed because there was usually a Jean in it and Armin was quite partial to Jean. 

When Jean flopped down onto the bed beside Armin, he pressed his face against Armin's neck and said, " Oh, god, you don't even understand how much you make me want to spume right now. I want to spume everywhere, like, you're so hot."

Armin had no clue what Jean was even going on about. He leaned up onto his elbows and eloquently replied, "What?" 

"I guess that one was a bit of a stretch. It sounds like a dirty word though, doesn't it." 

"I suppose so. It means to make froth or foam though. I think it was just a vaguely aquatic word semantically that they made do with when they names the park sectors," Armin said. 

"They should have given up on the rhyming thing," Jean muttered before lacing his hand with Armin's and pressing a kiss to the other man's fingers. "Balloon Town is barely acceptable but the fact that this season we have an Igloo Town is bordering on a crime. All the same, I do really want to make you spume right about now." 

"That's really gross."

"Hmm, see, that's the thing. I'm not funny when I'm with you," Jean said. 

"Eren said you're never funny." Jean made a tired sound and Armin smiled. "I think you're funny though." 

"Yeah? That's good."

Armin followed easily when Jean pulled him in for a kiss by his T-shirt. Although, it wasn't Armin's T-shirt, it was just one of Jean's that was soft and faded with age. Jean had a lot of old T-shirts that Armin liked to slip into, but Armin worried about this supply of clothes running out because already this one barely carried Jean's scent. He'd have to start rationing himself unless he forced Jean to wear multiple layers at once so that these clothes would remain a renewable resource. 

He shivered at Jean's hand as it swept across his ribs under the soft cotton. If anything, the feel of Jean's hands was an upgrade from clothes that smelled like him. The swipe of Jean's thumb over his nipple made him gasp and Jean smirked at that. 

"I really like you wearing my clothes," Jean murmured. 

"I like wearing your clothes." 

"Does wearing my clothes make you want to spume?"

"I think it's just you in general that makes me want to spume," Armin admitted.

 

#

 

Jean was confused. He wiped his sleeve across his eyes and the sight before him did not change. The sounds of yells, tanks and rifle fire muted. He needed everything he could to make sense of what he was seeing. Clumps of dirt and shrapnel flew high into the air, maybe ten feet from where Jean stood, and as graceful as the rise it all fell in a dirty shower. 

Jean sank to his knees, brain fuzzy with incomprehension. He had never known anything like this. He'd killed men in this war. An old man died of a heart attack back down in the mine. He'd had to watch while the Second Lieutenant shot Marco while he was still twitching yet had no hope of living. This was different though. 

Armin's cheek was still warm. Jean's thumb swiped across the youthful plumpness of his cheek to clear away some of the mud that clung so insistently on his skin.

"Wake up, Armin." 

He dropped his gun and lifted Armin's head onto his lap. He was limp and pliable - surely that meant something. He shook Armin's shoulders a few times and tapped his cheek but to no avail. He took a deep breath and he knew he shouldn't have but he took off Armin's helmet. He swallowed against the lump in his throat. Armin's eyes were not quite closed and the vacant white sliver visible through the parted lids seared against Jean's chest.

"Armin, can you walk? Should I take you back to the trench? We're only a quarter of a mile out so we'll be back in no time." 

It was more like half a mile back to the trench really but Jean needed Armin to wake up. He cradled the other man more closely to his chest and his heart leapt when he heard a sickening gurgle from Armin. Jean blinked a few times and saw the glistening red line along the crack of Armin's lips. It was probably just his eyes seeing things. His thumb dragged at Armin's lower lip and more blood seeped out. That wasn't supposed to happen. He was supposed to simply take Armin back to the trench and the nurses would fix him up. He'd be fine. He hadn't lived through lice and sores and gas attacks and the constant threat of death to die here in an anonymous patch of land in France. 

"I don't think I'll be able to carry you because my right arm doesn't have the strength for that. If you could just wake up, I can take you back and..." Jean found it harder and harder to push his words past the lump in his throat. He swallowed hard and blinked his eyes a few times because of the excess moisture. "Did you forget that I was going to take you to Blackpool? Remember, I told you that you hadn't really seen the sea. You need to have a proper day at the seaside; ride a donkey, eat some fish and chips, explore the rock pools, remember? You promised me that you would take me to your home too. You said I simply had to see Shropshire with you. Because you told me about that iron bridge, and that I had to see it to really appreciate the..." 

Finishing his asinine little demands of Armin was getting to be too much. Nothing he had said yielded any reaction anyway and Jean wondered whether the man could hear him. He hunched over and held Armin as tightly as he could. He cringed at the wet gurgling coming from Armin's chest and the hot stickiness of the blood that trickled out of the man's mouth and down his neck. He muffled his sobs in Armin's shoulder and as he shook, and as his tears soaked into the scratchy fabric of Armin's uniform jacket, he hoped a stray bullet might catch him. 

After everything they had said and done, Armin was not allowed to leave him. He couldn't. They were supposed to go back to England and work things out. They were supposed to have some sort of life together, a life where they would learn to easily deflect questions raised about sexuality and the lack of interest shown in young ladies. Armin was supposed to be his. This simply was not fair. Armin promised that he would try not to die. He had promised. 

 

#

 

Armin didn't know what to say when Eren asked him where the hell he had been for the past month and a half. He had been coming into work and going about his daily business as usual, so he was confused. Surely he would remember going missing for a whole month and a half. Eren glared at him and said, "What the fuck, dude, have you even been home recently?" 

Armin exchanged a look with Jean beside him. He had been back to his parents house recently; a few days ago he and Jean had a fight after which Armin surprised his parents by asking to sleep in his own bed again. It had only been for the one night though because Jean turned up before lunchtime the next day, with an apology, and the plastic duck that didn't quite win him a date, and asked him to come back. He couldn't quite remember what the argument was about at the moment, but maybe that was for the best while they were making up, but it had started over something stupid like cereal brands. Armin was practically domesticated, having arguments about cereal, and it hit him that aside from that instance he hadn't been back home at all. He shrugged and said, "I was home the other day."

"Yeah, I fucking know that. Your parents told me when they asked how you'd been doing at your new place since the fight."

"I didn't say it was my new place. I promise, I just said I was staying over some nights. I mean, it's not like I live there. I don't pay rent or anything," Armin said. Jean nodded and sipped his beer. His knee bounced a few times under Armin's hand but he did nothing else.

"Hey, why are you acting all apologetic with him? What about me? Like ten times I went to your house and waited for you, but you were never going to show the whole time. What's up with that?"

Armin hadn't been out in ages. He and Jean mostly just stayed in unless they were grocery shopping or going to work. They went to the cinema and had dinner out a few times too. They hadn't been out to a bar at night time though so Armin sort of wanted to use the excuse of not being able to hear over the din to avoid answering Eren. However he had learnt in the past that Eren was too clever for people to use selective hearing as an excuse for anything. Clever or stubborn, Armin was not quite sure which one. He took a sip of his own beer to give him time to think of how to answer but was saved at Mikasa's return from the bathroom. 

"They're living together," she said flatly. 

"What?" 

"We're not! Mikasa, why would you say something like that? I told you we weren't living together, we're just-"

"Cohabiting," she said serenely as though she had perfectly finished the sentence. She hadn't though and, despite the fact Armin really did want to officially live with Jean, he did not want to force anything here. As Eren spluttered his way through processing the information, Armin suddenly became aware of how stiff Jean had gotten. He lifted his hand from Jean's knee and was going to rest it in his own lap, keep his hands to himself, when Jean grabbed his hand as though Armin keeping his hands to himself was the last thing he wanted. 

"Actually, we are," Jean said. "We'll accept your congratulations in the form of indifference and indignation." 

Mikasa didn't react. Eren was more gracious than expected and didn't provide much in the way of indignation. He said, "This guy? This is who you're living with?"

Armin couldn't really answer though. He was having trouble getting his brain to work again. He chanced a glance at Jean who said, "We might as well, right? I mean, we even had your parents round for Sunday Dinner last week. You've practically moved in with me all ready."

Jean looked hopeful and Armin found himself fascinated by the way emotions on Jean's countenance stirred complimentary emotions within his chest. He too felt hopeful, and perhaps even relieved. 

The remainder of the evening passed in a smudge of dreamy disbelief. Eren kept muttering and grumbling about how Armin was being stupid, but not even Mikasa was letting him dampen the mood. She quickly changed the topic to how the log flume was coming along, though Eren would follow and of Jean's comments with annotations along the lines of "You're practically a married couple, what's up with that? You guys couldn't possibly bring a child into the world with the economy the way it is." He would probably take it a lot better when he wasn't drunk but Armin couldn't even bring himself to care that even that much. 

When he and Jean got home they fervently celebrated even though Armin had really been living with Jean all along. Naked and needing, they celebrated again and again with artful licks and bites, heated touches and half-lidded glances, desperate groans and warning pants. 

At some point in the night, Jean said, "You can't go back to your parents if we have another fight. You have to tell me I'm stupid or fight me for the bed and make me sleep on the sofa."

And Armin replied with, "I don't think I'd want to fight you."

Jean held Armin close and through gritted teeth said, "You absolutely must fight me. If I am being a dumb asshole, if I am doing anything that is hurting you, you have to make me see that I could lose you. I'd do the same if I ever thought you were being an asshole to me." 

Armin's rebuttal came in the form of a hand snaking down Jean's front and nodding before starting a whole new round of languid celebratory sex. 

 

#

 

Jean spoke to Armin every day.

They would talk about everything and nothing - well, Jean would be the one doing most of the talking - and Armin would twine their fingers together and press gentle kisses to Jean's cheek. They would plan for the future and away from the sounds of everything and everyone else, Jean had never been happier. 

During his periods of lucidity, Jean wanted to die. All around the ward were others like him, a lot more not quite like him at all. Men whose jaws never fully fit together so drool would trickle down their chins and seep into the material of their different sorts of uniforms. Men with missing limbs and scars of skin that had been sloughed from their bones. Men in wheelchairs and men with vacant eyes. All of them men who had lost their minds. 

The nurses looked exhausted all the time and Jean thought it must be just as tough in these hospitals as it was on the frontlines. At least on the frontlines there was an escape somehow. Here in the stinking wards, where disinfectant didn't quite mask the vomit, piss, blood and bile, nobody was allowed to die. Sunken eyes and mouths that didn't work and fingers that could hold nothing and shrieking neighbours had to be tolerated until the end. 

When Jean understood the world around him, he would miss Armin. He might even remember his dreams of him and Armin in a strange place with strange customs but a total togetherness. 

He hoped it was real, that Armin would come to him eventually. 

And then his eyes would glaze and his brain might flash him into a seizure where he might see Armin again.


End file.
